Scars
by littlemiss123
Summary: A Scar is a mark on the body left by a wound not fully healed. In a post-war Hogwarts this seems to be all that connects the students anymore. Until they are thrown desperately together by fate in a whirlwind of events leading to love, lust, utter confusion and self-doubt. All the while a dark force is lurking waiting to strike out and seek revenge.
1. Prologue

They were bound together, she did not know it, neither did they.

It was a summer day like any other. Boring and utterly uneventful. But the ancient sisters who so loved to weave their webs of fate chose this day to irreversibly string three souls together. On this day, three discontented hearts decided to pack. Three unhappy minds decided to return. Of course, these three sisters were mere phantasms of fiction.

All the matters anymore is fact. No stories, no myths, no assumptions. Facts are what brought about destruction. Facts are what lead to her parents being unable to recognize her.

For weeks healers molded their minds, repairing the memories she was forced to obliterate. From that time months ago they were finally able to restore their minds to some degree her parents still look at her with moments of confusion. It's as though they lapse back into their unknowing state and she's an intruder in their home, her home. Even in moments of perfect clarity though, the daughter before them is not always recognizable. She does not match the girl of their memories. She is harder, more tight-lipped and on edge. She is never relaxed, never elated, she is always ready to explode with fear and misery. She never does, but it is right there under the surface. She terrifies them even in their most loving moments.

Her hair no longer runs wild, it is always contained in a braid or pulled up in a pony tail. Her eyes are not filled with curiosity and joy, but remain empty and solemn. Once, her mother caught her leaving the shower, the dreadful scar lacerated into her skin spoke millions of words her child never could. The young girl quickly hid her arm from view, rushing to her room and slamming the door shut.

Other things have been altered, the boys she once frequently spoke of with fervent fondness are now mentioned halfheartedly on the most rare of occasions. The red headed child is often referred to with sadness, she mentioned a loss once. He lost someone in a war her parents understand little of. Not that she tried to explain.

The hurt ran too deep, anyone could see that.

She was not alone in this, the dark haired boy was the same.

He spent a lot of time in his home, though the adults of the house wanted little to do with him. Something came over his cousin, though. Maybe it was the loss of his recently discovered defiance. Maybe it was the sight of his left hand. The boy in glasses was always so sure to keep it covered, with charms or even resorting to the muggle means of makeup. He forgot one day, one day of pure stupidity. The markings looked carved into his flesh, and for a moment the heavyset boy felt no jealousy, no annoyance or hatred. He felt sad. His entire life he mistreated this boy for being a horrific freak. Then, his envy emerged when he realized his abilities. But now, none of that. Now, knowing that the boy must have undergone such a heinous act, he felt only sadness.

The feeling would have faded were it not for the blank look in his once lively emerald eyes. Throughout his whole life he never did see such a look, and never would again. It was a vacuum. The penetrating stare would not allow you to look away until it felt as though your very heart were chilled. They were the eyes of someone who suffered. The eyes of someone who was lost.

Another boy had eyes the same. Though they were not the same enticing green, but a steely grey.

The others were isolated, but he was truly alone. His father was taken away, his mother taken ill. No one to care for him, he felt utterly lost.

The house elves were all there was to pity him. A young one, whose name he did not even know, was never far from his shadow. He saw his masters struggle, heard his cries at night. Were it not the relentless nightmares, it was his own scar. The mark would never leave his skin, it pierced his very soul. And it still cried out for the loss of its master. He could feel flames upon his skin, spreading throughout his body most nights, sometimes he was paralyzed in pain for days.

The healers told him they could give him potions, within weeks the pain would subside slightly, months it should be a faint ache. Three potions a day for the rest of his life. They tasted of mud and felt like chalk. In moments he drank them, he thought of dear Severus. The man never would have concocted something so foul, or if he did the steel eyed boy would never be expected drink it. Severus would find something, anything better for his beloved student. Now, no one looked out for him, no one cared for the pale-skinned boy.

He had never felt so forsaken.

These three all faced such different lives, but a twist in fate left them on even ground. All scarred and scared.

For one the option to repeat the seventh year, be in the only group of eight years to ever grace Hogwarts halls seemed an easy enough decision. Until the day came when trunks should be filled and the express should be boarded.

For one the option to repeat seemed vile. To see the people who suffered and lost, to not see those who died would be unbearable. The current situation was worse though. To be completely alone and in pain is much more heart wrenching than being surrounded by people who will quietly resent you. But to feel the attention of another human being was enough to endure. The deserved punishment to top it off would not be so regrettable in the end, for they knew that the sins committed must be acknowledged.

For one the option to repeat took weeks to accept. The disgust directed towards the student by all those but their very own house, if they even feel any loyalty, may be too disastrous to live with.

They all left their houses to face their eighth year, they all boarded the train and traveled to the place once considered a second, if not better, home. They all remember the war, the destruction that is surely fixed. But they remember. Bodies littered the grounds, walls fell, blood pooled, they became warriors. They became killers.

They took their first steps on the hallowed ground, and suddenly they all felt more lost than ever.

But the masks of their old selves still fit, and until the fateful day of Potions class not one student slipped.

Fate had other plans, as she weaved her wicked web, no one was left unscathed. The scars of the past must be uncovered, for She never forgets.


	2. Chapter 1

It has been two weeks. Two lousy weeks.

Another girl, indiscernible from the rest, trails out of his room self-consciously. He offers her a meaningless grin as she looks up at him through tousled hair. She's taking too long to gather her things and growing to be a bother, but he doesn't want to be entirely rude. As she makes her final effort to entice him to a next-time, he notices her blue tie still attached to a bedpost. He says nothing about it, only offers a short goodbye and rolls over in his bed to face a wall before she even reaches his door.

 _She meant nothing_. The thought isn't meant to be rude, it's just the truth. Just like the other girls, this wasn't meant to lead to some deep, all-consuming love. It was meant to pass the time, feel a little less lonely.

Harry turns his body again to lay on his back. He stares at the ceiling for a long time. He's too exhausted to leave his bed and face the others. The second he steps foot in the common room first and second years will swarm him, bloody groupies that don't have the faintest clue about the horrors everyone faced in the war. It isn't just him they flock to, it's all the others who returned for his year. He just happens to get the most attention. He hates it.

After a while he falls into a half sleep. The day goes by quickly and uneventfully for Harry. Classes pass and friends mingle, and he stays in bed waiting for her sweet smell to fade into his distant memory.

Hermione paces in her own room. She quietly recites the spells they discussed in class today trying to calm her nerves. She doesn't see the room around her, she isn't even fully aware of what she's doing. Moments like these make her appreciate those who rebuilt Hogwarts, creating more rooms so the eight years were either placed in singles or doubles. Hermione could not stand having another person see her this way. Anyone except for Luna that is. Hermione was grateful to see that the odd girl was placed as her roommate. Luna is strange, but brilliant and fierce and kind.

Luna is also a Ravenclaw, something that the Headmaster didn't think mattered all that much anymore. He told the returning eighth years that they all fought together, stood beside one another when the world they knew was being destroyed, so they could live together at random for their eight year. Luckily for Hermione the room they were assigned was in the Gryffindor tower, something Luna also enjoyed as it made sneaking off with Neville a lot easier.

Thinking about Luna calms Hermione's nerves. The energy building within her begins to fade, and the room around her comes back into focus.

 _I need to find-_ Hermione cuts off her own thought. She doesn't know who she needs to find. For a moment she was going to think Ron. She can't find Ron. Ron isn't here. Ron has gone off. Ron left with his family to tour the world and try to regain a sense of normalcy without ever saying goodbye, without a single word in eight months.

"I need to find Dean."

It would be his bloody good lucky to be stuck in the Gryffindor tower. Whatever is going on in that blasted headmasters head to think that their houses shouldn't matter in their eighth year is beyond Draco. He can't wait for McGonagall to take over the position so she can fix this mess.

Surprisingly, the hate he receives is not plentiful from the mouthbreathers below. They typically just ignore his presence, or offer meek smiles and a look away.

Draco knew that this year would be miserable, better than life at home, but still bleak. He didn't, however, predict that it would be miserable in this bloody tower. He had looked forward to the familiar chill of the dungeon, the glow of the green banner against the cold grey wall. It became a comfort to him.

But now he is lost, more lost than ever and miserable.

Luckily, Blaise and Pansy returned as well. The three of them are among seven returning Slytherin, the smallest amount of returnees for any house, predictable. All Slytherin returnees fought the war in a shade of grey, either switching sides or abandoning He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named's fight and leaving the battlefield. Blaise switched to fight against the Death Eaters, Pansy abandoned the battle before it ever began. They were all forgiven. They were all welcomed back with the hopes that they could have a redeemable future now that they've "seen the light".

Draco isn't sure he's seen anything. He just realized that he fought for his mother. He fought so his father couldn't hurt his mother anymore than he already had. Sure, she wasn't exactly innocent, but they had all been brought up to view the world a certain way and that can't change at the drop of a hat. Change takes time. Change takes patience. Change takes one person who sees the truth underneath the facade. Maybe that's who Draco is, the person to facilitate change. Not on a grand scale, but within his own mind and possibly his mothers. Of course he still sees the value in being a pureblood, but blood isn't worth killing over. Blood isn't worth being killed over.

Draco's thoughts are interrupted by Dean slamming open their bedroom door.

"Hey," Dean offers a feeble grin. The two of them have been surprisingly friendly since the unwelcome announcement that the two would be living together. Dean is pleasant enough, a little sad behind the eyes but so are all of the other eight years. Dean doesn't mind Draco much now, at first he feared him, but then he started hearing Draco at night. Dean can hear him cry out in pain, he hears the anguish in his voice, he hears him cry for his mother. Dean knows that he's the same as everyone else who fought, he was just born on a different side.


End file.
